Greetings from Lake Wobegon!

I returned home to the beautiful state of Minnesota after a stellar WOOLF training trip with Sam and Robby only to discover that the Midwest is a whole lot flatter than I remembered. And there are a lot of mosquitos. But it's still an awesome state that you should all come visit.

The CXC elite team was here in the St. Croix Valley doing a two-week regional training camp so I spent the past fourteen days having a lot of fun, training with, and getting my butt kicked by the CXC athletes including (not to be name-dropping or anything...) Garrott Kuzzy, Caitlin Compton, Brian Cook, Gus Kaeding and the #1 skier in Scotland, Alastair Duncan. Garrott was staying with my best friend from home, Andrew Poffenberger, so Poff and I got to join in on some nice OD skis and some not-so-nice (read: killer) specific strength and interval sessions with the team. Pretty sweet.


Aside from that I've been overworking myself as usual, going to swim club, lifting, running, biking to and from work, and attending various ski practices. Plus, I've been enjoying the comforts of home, including way way way too much food and a well-tuned piano. Poff and I also got to go in to the city and see Barack Obama's victory speech at the Xcel center in St. Paul. We stood in line for about 5 hours, which is where I was able to observe the awesome bus advertisement pictured at top and the t-shirt vendor's ever-so-appropriate slogan at right. My summer job, which I thought was going to be really great, turned out to be kind of boring and pointless and full of old women who make me move tables and chairs and water coolers all over the place because none of them can lift more than 5 pounds at a time. I did manage to make friends with a guy from Minneapolis who does our yard work twice a month because he got a DWI and was sentenced to community service. His name is Tarell. He's pretty cool.

Right now, I am super excited to get Robby's and my WOOLFies next week and am dreading the rollerski time trial that I have tonight. And to Evan: I accept your challenge. Bring on the crunches.

Peace!!
Maddy